The approaches described in this section are approaches that could be pursued, but not necessarily approaches that have been previously conceived or pursued. Therefore, unless otherwise indicated, it should not be assumed that any of the approaches described in this section qualify as prior art merely by virtue of their inclusion in this section.
A home, café, bar, etc., may have more than one device capable of playing media content. For example, desktop computers, tablet computers, mobile devices, etc., may be used to access web-based broadband content. A high-end HDMI TV may be connected to a set-top box with cable and satellite connections. One or more digital video recorders (DVRs) may also be used to access, record, playback, etc., media content available from broadband and/or broadcast media sources. One or more of the above-mentioned devices may be equipped with tuners that can be used to access media content, while the remaining may not. It is difficult and cumbersome for one media device to access physical resources such as physical tuners of a different media device since devices may be manufactured by different vendors. The situation gets worse when multiple users and/or multiple media devices, which may be located in different parts of a home, fight to access, record, playback, etc., their own favorite shows with a limited number of tuners.